


Artemisia in Snow

by witchoil



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: F/M, Fluff and Angst, Force Bond (Star Wars), Force Healing, Huddling For Warmth, Hypothermia, Stranded, but not in that order
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-08
Updated: 2017-12-08
Packaged: 2019-02-12 02:03:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,698
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12948933
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/witchoil/pseuds/witchoil
Summary: Rey knows she has fucked up the instant the engine temperature drops below 200 centigrade.Lucky for her, Kylo knows it, too.





	Artemisia in Snow

**Author's Note:**

> A little something inspired by a conversation with a friend who I feel may want to remain anonymous for now. They brought to my attention some interesting facts about hypothermia I had never heard before and, for the first time in my life, I caught a plot bunny. 
> 
> Apparently, in the end stages of hypothermia, people begin to feel extremely hot because the blood vessels in their extremities -- which have been trying to keep blood concentrated at the core -- suddenly dilate. Because of this, they may try to disrobe to alleviate the heat. Shortly after, they begin to burrow.
> 
> Here's what the article says:
> 
> "As people succumb to the cold, they tend to run – away from their present location and away from companions who might help them. They go out into the cold, stripping as they move. And when they finally feel the end coming, they try to find some quiet, hidden spot to die." - [io9, Why Freezing to Death Makes You Want To Get Naked](https://io9.gizmodo.com/why-freezing-to-death-makes-you-want-to-get-naked-1688151366)
> 
> **As always,[have a playlist!](https://open.spotify.com/user/1215030018/playlist/0j1PQxVqv0T5bv2lL2TASA) Y'all know I love my playlists.**

Rey knows she has fucked up the instant the engine temperature drops below 200 centigrade. 

There’s a harsh metallic  _ thunk _ and a groaning sound like someone who’s had their finger bent back a few degrees too far. She should have known the intel was too good to be true, but when it came like it did, in a  _ dream _ , no less--- Well, could she really be blamed? 

Rey shrugs on a parka and a second pair of socks before ducking out the entrance bay, closing it quickly behind her to preserve what little warm air remains inside. A stinging wind sears her cheeks and brows, with tiny flakes of ice that feel like needles on her skin. The same wind seems to lift the edges of all of her clothes and crawl between the layers, moving close to her body as though she is not wearing a jacket or insulating underlayers at all. 

But these feelings are nothing compared to the one that steals over her when she rounds the corner. The ship’s outer engines are already covered in a thin layer of ice, getting thicker by the second. She feels her heart slither downwards through her body and land, frozen, in her feet. 

She fetches a spanner from the ship and attempts to attack the ice that way, but makes minimal headway. It’s likely that the snow melted on the hot engines and immediately re-froze around them as they cooled, forming a coat as shiny and hard as polyplasteel lacquer. 

Realizing she is out of her depth, Rey makes the hard call: she’ll have to leave. She doesn’t have the right equipment for this mission right now, and staying is more dangerous than starting up the ship and returning later with help. 

Disappointed, Rey jams the side of her fist into the door release, already shivering.

There is that same metallic groan again as it begins to open.

But nothing happens. The door doesn’t actually open. 

_ Oh, shit _ , Rey thinks.

\--

Kylo Ren knows something is wrong minutes before he is fully awake. His face stings and his fingers ache inside the joints. His first thought is that he is about to die and his second is that his entire body is shaking in his cot. There’s sweat on his brow, but he’s so kriffing  _ cold _ . 

Jerking upright and shaking the sleep from his head, Kylo recognizes this disconnect. She’s talking to him -- not intentionally, but she is. And she’s in massive trouble by the feel of it. 

Her fear pulls tight like a tether between them and Kylo follows it back to its start -- wind and ice, a white sky stretching like infinite radio static above her, a distant, feeble sun. She is trapped on the glacial hemisphere of Vallt and her ship is frozen shut with her commlink inside. 

Kylo is dressing and bursting into the hall before he can even think of what he’s doing. It’s not a matter of tactics or orders, but instinct. His boots slip on the polished durasteel of the floor as he makes a right and he slams his shoulder into the sharp corner of the wall with a gasp. But even that doesn’t slow him enough to think it through, let alone stop him. 

All he can feel is the chill worming its way under her skin and a certainty that he has to stop it before it gets deeper. 

Commandeering the fastest ship in the hangar, it still takes Kylo nearly three hours to cut through a galactic arm and emerge into the Vallt system. He fights against the itching burn of phantom cold and mild confusion to land the ship as near to Rey’s as he can.  

It takes only a few minutes to pick up her trail and find the beginning point of her fear. The ship is dark -- no lights or systems left on, a charmingly naive mistake if it weren’t so dangerous -- and rapidly disappearing into the landscape of snow and ice. Kylo circles around it, vainly hoping that she has stuck close. He sees icicles hanging off of the wings and a hard crust of ice expanding slowly to cover the landing bay door at its back. 

It will take a remote ignition or a lightsaber to open again and, reaching out -- ah, yes, there it is. She left his grandfather’s saber inside, a tiny pin-point of bright blue hope maddeningly trapped inside the cabin. He imagines her trying to call it to her, listening to it rattle and bang against the walls of the ship, unable to bring it as effortlessly to her hand as he knows she can. Instead of filling him with vindication, the thought makes something in his chest clench.

In a futile but necessary gesture, he calls her name.

“Rey!” 

The taste of it hangs in his throat and mouth, but the sound is swept away in a flurry of snow. He has never called out to her like this before, he realizes. He does it again.

“REY!” 

And though he hates that this is how it has to happen, a part of him jumps to hear it again -- her name on his lips, coming from inside his own body. 

Something in the forest of ice and dead wood before him flickers. He has no choice but to follow, plunging headlong through the banks that separate them. 

The tether between them remains, but Kylo Ren can feel it fading with every moment as Rey loses her senses. Neither of them knows where she is or what she’s doing. Even her feelings, usually so strong on her face and in her heart, become muddied, distant. 

He can tell how far he is, though, despite the interference. Too far for her to hear him, certainly, possibly too far to save her. 

He calls out anyways.

After the first mile, his feet begin to cramp inside his boots. They have that chilled feeling that prevents him from being able to tell if they are wet or merely cold. His layers of synthcloth, specially engineered for a range of terrains and climes, can only do so much to stave off this cold, it seems. 

Around the second mile, his hands have become frozen claws, even tucked under his arms. His teeth chatter as he sweeps the landscape, thinking hopes strong enough that someone more faithful might have called them prayers. He can still feel her over the land, but only barely.

She’s beginning to disappear into the white, just like her ship. 

And cold feet and frozen hands aside, he pushes onwards, just a little faster than before. 

As he nears the third mile, he comes across two things: a footstep, clear in the snow, and a tube of cloth that he swears he’s seen before. 

Kylo follows the footstep forward to another and another, and they quickly devolve into a twisting canyon path through the snow, less disturbed here under the cover of the dead trees. More careless, too, he realizes with a swell of panic. It’s uneven and confused, like she was trying to walk straight but couldn’t.

He clutches at his sides from a feeling more than just the cold. And there! There’s another piece of cloth. 

Reaching down to examine it, Kylo’s heart drops as he realizes what it is. One of Rey’s arm coverings -- the second of the two, he supposes. She took it off? Out here? 

He looks ahead, down the plow-track of her path and sees something else. He sprints towards it. Her belt. 

Oh, stars, no, what was she doing? 

He ran down the path, finding a jacket, then a thin vest, then a boot. He is breathing hard but only half from exertion when he finds a tunic shirt, then another boot, one left on top of the other. And barely a foot away, her pants. 

He doesn’t even bother to collect them, but  _ runs _ , full-out, down the tracks she’s left until he finds its end. 

She is there and the sight is worse than any of his nightmares.

Rey is naked, her skin gone grey-blue all over her body, her front half disappearing into a drift of snow that has collected at the base of a large tree. 

For a heart-stopping moment, he thinks she is already dead. But in the silence as he holds his breath, he hears movement. A toe scrapes behind her. The edge of a dusky, frozen finger appears near her hip, then disappears again.

She’s… She’s  _ digging. _

Kylo falls to his knees behind her and grasps under her ribs with both hands, pulling her toward him with every ounce of strength he has left. He can feel the shadows of her ribs, the meager fat she’s put on top of them since they first met. He can feel how shallow her breathing is, those same ribs only barely expanding and contracting between his fingers. She is so cold, it feels like he’s embracing snow. 

With a heave, Kylo pulls her from her burrow and falls back onto his ass. He pushes and pulls against her sluggish body, impossible to get a good grip on, all rubbery cold skin and knobby joints. It is horrible, absolutely horrible, like wrestling with a corpse. 

Eventually he cradles her back in his right arm and winds his left around her bent knees. Her eyes are closed and her lips are so blue they’re nearly purple. 

“Rey,” he says, very softly. 

“What did you do?” He asks. To her, himself, no one. 

She breathes and it sounds like a death rattle. It is a sound he suddenly hates that he knows so well.

“Fuck,” he breathes. He doesn’t know how to fix this. He doesn’t know why he needs to.

Reaching back with the hand that had held her legs, he unfastens his cloak and tries to swaddle her in it. She is so small like this, so vulnerable, and this isn’t nearly enough. Kylo struggles to shimmy his way out of his outermost layer, almost dropping Rey in the process. His heart tries to jump out of his chest at the thought of her touching the snow again, but he catches her and pulls the jacket tight around her shoulders, fastening it under her chin with trembling fingers. 

They are two children, alone in the snow, and one or both of them are about to die. 

It hits him like a sledgehammer to the knee, like the force of her mind crashing into his all those months ago. 

He wishes she were here to deal with this, fierce and inventive, so much better equipped for the disasters of life than he is. 

He remembers that she is here and it is so much worse. 

He breaks down as he holds her, crying with deep, gasping breaths and silent, hiccupping sobs that make him feel like he is vomiting up his tears from somewhere far below himself. It hollows him out in a matter of minutes -- one and a half, to be more exact. Ninety-seven seconds. 

When it is done, he feels small. Against the landscape, even within his own clothes, he feels like he’s shrinking away, becoming weak and incapable. 

He had hoped -- had prayed when he had the faith for it -- that he would never be back in this place again, but Kylo Ren has never known himself to be lucky. His life has never been more than a series of broken promises, most of all the ones he has tried to make to himself. 

But feeling Rey in his arms, he can’t stomach that. He can let himself down, but he can’t imagine letting her down. Not if it meant letting her  _ die _ . 

Kylo Ren stumbles up from the ground, grunting with the effort and clumsily trying to adjust Rey in his arms. She’s heavier than she looks, he thinks, and the thought could almost bring a smile to his face. Stronger than people think she is, hearty desert rat. And she’s going to survive the cold, too. 

As he starts to turn, he listens closely for her breath, but it is so, so faint. And her hands haven’t moved since he wrapped her in his cloak. He feels panic again, certain he has to do something but having no idea how to do it. If he can get her to his ship, he can warm her up and feed her. The trouble, he thinks distantly, is getting her there alive. 

Kylo clutches her even more closely to his body and thinks further back than he’s allowed himself to in years. He knows Force healing is possible, but he doesn’t know if it will help him now, nor if he is even capable. Peace and selflessness are necessary components, he knows, and these are not things he possesses a surplus of. 

Looking down, though, he doubts his own doubt. If he could take the heat within his body and give it to her right now, he would do it. Even if it meant freezing in her place. He is so afraid for her -- for both of them, but mostly for her -- and so tired that he can’t even conjure the energy to protest. So he takes a breath, looking at her face for another moment, and closes his eyes.

He had thought that she was almost gone, before he found her, but with her so close to him it’s unmistakable: she’s right here. She’s glowing lavender-white and trembling in the force, a tiny point of light like a dwarf star. Small, but hot somewhere down at the center. 

He holds that light in his mind’s eye as he walks, imagining his own light leeching into hers and making it grow. Trudging back through the rough path he made to her, he imagines the trembling intensifying until it is a strong vibration, alive in his arms. He imagines this light guiding him even as the light of the sun begins to grow dimmer around them. His hands grow colder and stiffer as he goes, but instead of moving them, he imagines that they are the conduit through which his life-heat flows to her. 

Every single part of him hurts by the time the trees start to thin, but Kylo Ren’s thoughts are elsewhere, effortlessly pulled away from his pain by the promise of doing this -- this  _ one _ thing -- right. 

He looks down. Rey’s lips are still so blue they hurt to look at, but something is different. Her fingers are fisted now, instead of clawed, and she is shivering against Kylo’s chest. Even her eyes, though closed, are moving. Mouth opening in pleased surprise, Kylo draws a shuddering, freezing breath. She’s alive, and she’s warmer than before. 

He adjusts her in his arms again and strides with renewed purpose towards the clearing. 

By the time that they reach his ship, Rey shakes so hard that Kylo is afraid he’ll drop her before they get inside. Her teeth chatter in her mouth and if he looks down, he can see that she’s squeezing her eyes shut and furrowing her brows in concentration. It is a poor imitation of the girl who hunted him on Starkiller, but it is that girl and he’s almost dizzy with relief. 

Kylo stumbles, falls to a knee a few feet before his ship, and takes a moment to right himself. Alright then, dizzy with relief  _ and _ exhaustion. 

Worried that he’s jostled her, Kylo dips his head momentarily to look at Rey. She murmurs something he can’t understand and her eyes flutter. Slowly, they begin to open. 

When she looks at him he realizes for the first time that he has forgotten his helmet. She is meeting his eyes and he is meeting hers, too, unafraid. Scrambling out of his quarters, it didn’t even occur to him-- 

Then a tiny smile pricks at the corners of her blue lips and he is lost, he can’t even try to follow the thought. Except, not quite. He knows this much: he likes it when she looks at him. He loves that she has seen his face. 

He stands, even slower this time than the last, and brings her inside.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks, as always, for reading!
> 
> I'm not sure if this is actually finished (there's a scene or two after this that I desperately want to write), and I have an inkling that it might take place in the same soon-to-be-canon-divergent timeline as Vestal, but I suppose we'll just have to see, won't we? If you guys are really into the idea of a sequel, I might get my ducks in a row and throw one up.


End file.
